Safety Nets

Remember a few years ago when President Bush proposed that Social Security essentially become privatized.  That each of us has our own investment account where Wall Street could sell us promises to keep us in our elder years comfortably if we just invested in their products?

Ah, now is the time to be grateful that idea died, at least for now.  It certainly is still being bandied about in the same discussions that policy makers have concerning the health of the Social Security system.  But at least for now, it seems hibernating.

And thank goodness.  At the very least, most of us lost 20% on the stock market.  At the worst perhaps half our savings.  I constantly hear people in their 50s talking about how they now realize they will not be able to retire.  Several days ago I received an accounting of a defined pension from a non-profit employer in my past.  Not only has the employer not been fully funding the pension obligations but the earnings in the pension have obviously declined.

Social Security is the safety net, now, for many of our elders who have lost significant savings.  Unlike the Great Depression we probably won't see many of our esteem citizens dying alone in the streets of starvation or lack of housing.

But, the promises that we made to ourselves, that corporate America made to it's workers, that if we worked hard, produced, we could retire, has vanished.  

As we begin to imagine our world post-Depression and the pundits rant about the high costs of Social Security, think about all the times in our lives that we have needed safety nets.  It will pay to make sure we maintain and enhance this system.  So far, it has been reliable and hasn't failed, unlike Wall Street, real estate, and the dot.com debacles.